Amaia Sánchez-Velasco

Amaia Sanchez-Velasco is an architect, researcher and educator. She graduated from ETSAM in 2011, the year she founded GRANDEZA STUDIO with Jorge Valiente Oriol and Gonzalo Valiente Oriol. Their work studies late-capitalist spaces and narratives to identify – through critical analysis – and challenge – through political imagination – the mechanisms that veil and normalize structural forms of violence. GRANDEZA STUDIO methodologies entangle with research, critical spatial practice, writing, performance, design, filmmaking and pedagogy.

Amaia has been involved in architectural research and education since 2015, coordinating and teaching design studio, representation and theory courses at the University of Technology Sydney. She has also lectured in institutions such as The Berlage TUDelft, ETSAM, Design Academy Eindhoven, University of Montréal, Universidad Andrés Bello, Powerhouse Museum Sydney, MIT Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Domus Academy Milan, Triennale di Milano, amongst others.

As part of GRANDEZA STUDIO, her recent work titled Pilbara Interregnum: Seven Political Allegories is currently exhibited at the 18th Biennale Architettura 2023 in Venice (titled “The Laboratory of the Future”). Also, their film Strata Incognita (co-directed along with Locument) is part of the Spanish pavilion of the same edition of the Biennale di Venezia and has been nominated for best short film in international film festivals. In 2019, Amaia co-directed the Australian Pavilion Teatro Della Terra Alienata for the XXII Triennale di Milano Broken Nature: Design Takes on Human Survival, which was awarded the Golden Bee to the best national pavilion. The work was acquired in 2021 by the National Gallery of Victoria (NGV) for its inclusion in the museum’s permanent Contemporary Design and Architecture collection. Coinciding with the acquisition, the team published the book Teatro Della Terra Alienata: Reimagining the Fate of the Great Barrier Reef with Bartlebooth. GRANDEZA STUDIO’s work has been widely published and exhibited in Germany, the USA, Chile, Denmark, Spain, Italy, Portugal, the Netherlands, Sweden and Australia.

Corporate Experience

• Co-director of the creative architecture studio GRANDEZA STUDIO, in collaboration with Jorge Valiente Oriol and Gonzalo Valiente Oriol. 2011 - Present

• Architect and design team leader in the competition department of Sauerbruch-Hutton, Berlin, Germany. 2013 - 2014

• Architect at Ubicca Arquitectos 2011 - 2013

• Architectural Assistant at Sauerbruch-Hutton studio, Berlin. Germany, 2009 - 2010

• Architectural Assistant at Aranguren & Gallegos, Madrid. 2006 - 2007

Academic Experience

• Medialab Matadero Research residency with Jorge Valiente Oriol, Madrid. 2023 - 2024

• Research residency 'Remote Residences' granted by the School of Architecture at the Campus Creativo, Universidad Andrés Bello, Chile as part of Grandeza Studio. 2022

• Guest professor in Master Class at the Domus Academy in Milan. 2022

• Professor, researcher, and subject coordinator of architectural projects and representation of Undergraduate and Postgraduate courses. School of Architecture, Faculty of Architecture and Building Design. University of Technology Sydney (UTS). 2016 - 2022

• Adjunct professor and coordinator of design studio and representation subjects. School of Architecture, Faculty of Architecture and Building Design. University of Technology Sydney (UTS). 2015 - 2016